Man, this life sure does get weird. I realize that I just said that, but I am forced to say it again as life continues to chug happily down the road toward OFF THE DEEP END.

I've been feeling kind of melancholy lately; nothing serious, just a constant, nagging, sort of wah-wah that hangs around in the back of my mind. I am hoping that it is a side-affect of going off birth control pills. That and the red sea that I have going on down there in my pants these past few days.

OOO, BURN. Slipped one in there on you guys. Let's just say Tampax ought to be paying ME at this point, as I am single-handedly keeping them in business, I'm pretty sure.

Next week will be a nutty one at work. Both my bosses are going to San Antonio, so I'll be handling all this stuff by myself, and by "this stuff" I mean not only will I have to do my blogging and online shopping, but I'll also have to handle the watching of the drum videos and making of crude jokes. WOOPS! I kid. Wow. I am headed straight for getting fired again, aren't I? We really do a lot of work, and it is twice as busy when I'm alone in taking care of everything.

I am really starting to have some very serious I-wish-it-would-just-go-away-already feelings about a few of the things I've been through. Clearly one cannot just choose these things; I've tried attacking these feelings with the whole spectrum of emotions from anger, to indifference, to hopefulness, to sadness, guilt, regret, contentment, indignance, relief, to pretending that the feelings don't exist at all.

Next weekend we're going to see the Pine Hill Haints at Bottletree, and then it's WEDDING TIME until August 8th. Not mine, of course; Kristi and Chris are getting married on August 8th. Jason is making the groom's cake and is the photographer and is making the wedding cake topper, and I'm the matron of honor and Reed is the ring bearer. It's a family event, folks! We gon' be wo' out by the end of it, I'm pretty sure, but I sure am excited, too.

I've got to get on planning the bachelorette party, including finding a good stripper; does anybody know if David Bowie can dress up as Jareth and take care of that for us?

Because the world doesn't have enough haikus, yo! Here are a few more.

Some haikus about my life lately:

I've been feeling crap-
tacular these days, for sure
Lobotomy-ho!

My throat hurts but lo!
Hot tea makes me pee too much.
Looks like beer it is.

Looking forward to
turning 30, not afraid
of the rickets. Ha!

Jason, your kid is
going to kill me, I fear.
Tell them to suck it.

I can't stop buying!
Anxiety makes me spend.
I need some more bling.

What the fuck, Prozac?
Where you been these past few months?
Don't do me like that.

"Holy fucking shit!"
my child exclaimed. I don't know
where he gets it from.

Kristi, Lindsey, Chris,
Jason and Duque and Reedy,
you my only friends.

Reed Daniel.

I really enjoy reading birth stories like this one, and by "enjoy" I mean "panic and dry-heave". I realized that I hadn't ever talked about the day that Reed was born here.

I didn't go into labor naturally. About four or five days after my due date at an appointment with my doctor's office, an all-too-enthusiastic doctor told me he'd see if he could "get things going" since I was so late.

First let me say that I had one of those ridiculous experiences with an office full of rotating doctors and every time I went in I saw a different one so that I'd be "familiar" with all the doctors when I went into labor and just whoever could step in and catch the baby as it came flying out of my hoo-ha.

Next let me tell you what this fucking happy-ass guy did to me to "get things going": he put on a latex glove, stuck his hand into my yaya and "swooped" his fingers roughly about my cervix trying to "manually" open it up. I shit you not. This is not a joke. IT HURT LIKE A SON OF A BITCH and I very nearly levitated off the table with all the pain. Jason said he kind of wondered if he needed to punch that guy in the face, but somehow he refrained.

So the doctor tells me that I might see my mucus plug at some point and to call them if anything happens. Not a damn thing happened.

The next week at my appointment (now 10 days past my due date) the lady doing the ultrasound noticed that I suddenly didn't have very much amniotic fluid in there, and they did an exam and realized that I'd been leaking and holy cow! they better induce labor. Tomorrow. Tomorrow would be good.

So we went home and I hyperventilated a little and realized I really was not that interested in pushing a honey-baked ham-sized creature out of that particular orifice. Oh, I forgot to mention that when they did the ultrasound they estimated that the baby in there probably weighed anywhere from 9 to 10 pounds. In case any of you aren't familiar, that's an XL-sized baby, absolutely not what I ordered.

So we headed to the hospital and six the next morning and checked in and they started an iv of pitocin to get the labor going. For the first hour or so, nothing happened. Then all of a sudden THAT SHIT WORKED and I was writhing around on the bed in a whole lot of pain, the kind of pain that you can't talk through or think through and all you can do is imagine fire and bombs exploding and bright, searing light. So the nurse checked me out and found that I was still only dilated to about 1 or 2 centimeters and so they couldn't give me the epidural, but they could give me a shot of Demerol to help with the pain. I politely said, "Yes, that would be lovely." About five minutes later I was totally drunk and resting comfortably.

We watched tv and just generally rested until woops! those contractions started ripping and tearing through the Demerol. They checked me and I was at 3 centimeters so they called the anesthesiologist (Would you believe that I spelled "anesthesiologist" correctly? I just went ahead and spell-checked because I thought there was no way I had guessed it, but I totally did. That right there is a testament to my love for Dr. Carlson, the fellow who gave me my epidural.).

So guess what? Throughout my pregnancy, I was so worried about getting the epidural, about the pain involved with some fellow jamming a large needle into my spine, about how you can be paralyzed and blah blah blah. I am here to tell you: IF YOU ARE HAVING CONTRACTIONS, FOR-REAL-THOUGH CONTRACTIONS THAT MAKE YOU WANT TO HIT YOURSELF IN THE FACE WITH A HAMMER UNTIL YOU LOSE CONSCIOUSNESS, THE TINY PRICK OF THE NEEDLE GOING INTO YOUR BACK REALLY ISN'T THAT BIG OF A DEAL. I had to sit up in the bed and sit very, very still on account of you don't want him jamming it in sideways or in the wrong place or whatever, so of course I started having a really intense contraction right as he starting giving me the epidural. Sitting perfectly still during a contraction is very difficult, and I managed only because of the expected benefit of the drugs seeping into my spinal cord.

He finished and told me it would take a minute for the drugs to take effect, so in the meantime I had a couple more meaty contractions to entertain myself with. Then, suddenly, I felt so fucking good. I felt relaxed and unafraid and sleepy, and I laid my head back and dozed. I could still feel the contractions but instead of feeling like PAIN! they felt like pressure; I could feel the muscles in my body contracting, but it didn't hurt.

Basically the rest was just that, rest, until I reached 10 centimeters dilation and they got me to start pushing. Eventually Reed's heart rate got kind of erratic, so SNIP SNIP they did an episiotomy and got some forceps and tugged Reed out of there into this cruel, cruel world, away from the comfort of my hospitable uterus.

And then there he was, gooey and shiny, bruised from the forceps, uttering the tiniest, cutest shriek of FUCK NO, PLEASE CAN I GO BACK FOR JUST A WHILE LONGER. And then we were parents. I was a mama, and Reed was my son.

Much ado about some stuff.

I haven't been able to feel rested lately for some reason. I've been getting a pretty good amount of sleep; I just still feel sleepy. Last Saturday I spent almost the entire day in bed, and when I dragged myself out of bed at SEVEN PM I was still drowsy and woozy. Kane and Jude were there with Reed and I would sort of shuffle and mope into the living room once an hour to say, "Do you guys need anything? Is everyone alive? Anybody eat any Comet or anything else I should know about? Y'all haven't barbequed the dog, have you? Alright, back to bed I go". I honestly think I could have stayed in bed until the next morning. I don't know.

And let me tell you, if I'm tired enough to not give a shit that Kane is walking around saying that he thinks he has PINK EYE, then I must be pretty damned tired.

I honestly don't think he had pink eye, though. Friday night one of his eyes was pretty red and irritated, but on Saturday it was much better, just barely veiny looking in one corner and not swollen at all. He was like, "Well, I know whenever I get pink eye it always hurts real bad the first night and then stops hurting." I am no pink eye expert, but I think it would have been weepy with green or yellow stuff and I think the outside of his eye, his eyelid and whatnot, would have been red-looking also if he actually had pink eye. Either way we bought him some pink eye drops and he seemed fine and so far no one else in the house has gotten any eye problems. Kane also just started wearing contacts a couple of months ago, and I think he could have just had some kind of irritation caused by that.

WOW, this is some boring shit. If you weren't sleepy before you read this, I bet you are now. I'm sorry I don't have anything more exciting to offer. It's the damn sleepiness- I am just kind of "meh" about everything. I'll try to bring something more exciting next time. Until then.....

...

Woah! Sorry! I fell asleep. What was I saying?

Their names are called, they raise a paw: the bat, the cat, dolphin and dog, koala bear and hog.

We have a lot going on in the next few weeks.

This weekend we're headed down to New Orleans to visit our friend Amanda and film a new Drunk Psychology. The next weekend is our good friend John's 30th birthday party. May will bring Mother's Day and India's birthday and Linnea's birthday, and then we're photographing a wedding at the end of the month.

It will only get busier from there. June brings Kane's, Jude's, Kristi's, and my birthdays, plus we're planning a baby shower for our friend Brock (yep), and our friends Dana and Wes are getting married and we're taking pictures, and we're throwing a huge party for Kristi's, Lindsey's, and my 30th birthdays combined.

In July we'll have Lindsey's birthday, my mom's birthday, and Brock's baby will be born.

August will bring Kristi's bachelorette party and shower, and then she and Chris are getting married on the 8th. Reed and I are in the wedding and Jason is the photographer. Then Chris' birthday is on the 19th.

I think I might go to bed for a while in September. So don't bother calling.

Reedy.

So much has been happening lately that I haven't gotten to write much about Reed. Here is a list of Reedy thingies:

1. He is SO IN to Spiderman and Batman right now. We haven't had cable/satellite for some time, but we still have our DVR box. We still get some gems like the Home Shopping Network and the Hallmark Channel, and whenever Dish Network is doing free previews of channels, we get those. We got a free preview of one of the fifty bajillion Disney channels a few weeks ago and managed to record about 75 THOUSAND episodes of Batman and Spiderman cartoons. I have seen all of them a lot of times. I am now intimately schooled in the stories of the Black Cat and Two Face and Venom and the Green Goblin and the Hobgoblin and King Pin. I realize that these are Disney cartoons but Jason- a.k.a. Comic Book Blowhard- says that most of the plot lines follow the comic books surpringly closely.

2. Reed has both a Spiderman costume and a Batman costume. They are both pretty cool, and we have a lot of trouble getting him to wear anything else. We can't exactly send him to school in a superhero costume so once or twice he has worn just the Spiderman mask to school, walked into his classroom with it on, then taken it off and kept it in his pocket all day long.

3. As a result of the combination #1 and #2, Reed is constantly wobbling and flipping and trotting through the house in his costumes saying "I'm Spiderman!" or "I'm Batman!" and falling into things and slipping and spilling stuff and just generally keeping me on my toes. He climbs up onto things and dangles about. He carried a shoelace around with him which he'll fling at you at any moment and then start hissing "Pssssss! Pssssss!" while holding his hand, wrist upturned, at you like Spiderman. Last night he spent some time wriggling along the top/back of the futon in his Spiderman costume. The minds of children: who the fuck knows.

4. We're still working on potty training, and we've almost got it. He goes to school every day in big boy underwear with no pull-up and makes it through the whole day without having any accidents. Then he comes home and I say, "Do you need to potty? Do you need to peepee? Tell me if you need to potty. If you feel like you need to use the bathroom, go to the bathroom. Let's just go for fun. Let's go to the bathroom and give it a try. Don't you need to pee? Don't you want to potty? Go to the potty if you need to pee." He inevitably resists and tells me over and over again that he does NOT need to go. Five minutes later he wets his pants, and the futon along with them. So, you know. Shit.

5. He goes to bed like a champ most nights. We start warning him at about 8:30 that it's almost time for bed, you have to go to bed in a minute, just so he'll be prepared. Then at 9:00 I carry him to bed and I sit in a tiny chair by his bed for about a minute-and-a-half. Then I kiss his hand, then he kisses my hand, and we say night-night. If Jason and I try and have a conversation in the living room Reed says, "Mommeh! Can y'all stop talking, please? I'm trying to sleep." So we talk quietly.

6. He is still sleeping in a crib. I think I'm just lazy on this point; plus I don't think that it's ever occurred to Reed that he might one day sleep in a big boy bed, so he doesn't complain, so I'm like, shmeh. His bed converts into a toddler bed and the prospect of his being able to just get up out of bed and wander about the house SCARES THE DOODOO OUT OF ME. See also #7.

7. A few months ago Reed reached the point in his growth and development when he figured out how to unlock and open the front door. FUCK. So we bought chains to put on all our doors (we have a bunch, our house is weird). Reed has figured out how to use his light sabre, or "white saver", to slide the chain out. MOTHERFUCKER, I said. He is agile and accurate as hell when he does this; there's no "he can do it sometimes". He can do it EVERY time with one hand tied behind his back, wearing a blindfold and a straightjacket. HE CAN, WE'VE TRIED IT.

8. When we went to Costa Rica he stayed mostly with my mom, and a little with my dad. He stayed with her from Tuesday, March 10th, through Friday, March 20th. It was a very long, crazy trip and a very long time to go without seeing my baby. On our last full day in Costa Rica I called my mom to check in and she told me that Reed had not only said the night before, "I want to go home and sleep in my own bed" but that he also asked if we were coming back. My child had to ask if I was coming back. Jason and I clutched each other in the questionable bed in our hostel room and cried together. I will never take another trip away from my child for that long as long as I live.

April Fool's Day!

Okay, so, now I've told my Costa Rica story and can finally get back to my much more important blather- you know: blahblahblah this life sucks blahblahblah crazy ex-wife blahblahblah fucking kids blahblahblah I guess I'll go to work blahblahblah drinking beer on the weekends blahblahblah laundry and I will kill Jason today blahblah.

Right? I mean, that's about it, right?

Hey, the next time you're wearing a slim-fitting denim pencil skirt and you've just finished using the bathroom, I want you to try and flush the toilet with your foot (like you do).

Just for funsies.

And now for the Micro Wrestling Federation.

For fuck's sakes, if Kane and Jude's step-dad continues to send these assy, threatening text messages to us, I'm going to visit Pelham with a large bag of poop. I cannot stand this any more. See here for further explanation.

Somehow lately I frequently feel like I'm standing in the middle of a crowded room screaming, and no one is noticing. It's lonely and sad, this feeling, and I'm afraid that feeling it this frequently for this long is starting to make me a shitty person. I feel vindictive, mad, self-centered.

There is a lot going on in the next couple of weeks. There's Midget Wrestling this Thursday (click that link, scroll down to see the poster), we have the kids this weekend, I'm scheduled to go to San Antonio with work February 9th through the 12th, and then Valentine's Day is that weekend. Plus, there are three birthdays in a row from the 14th through the 16th (Josh, Deanna, Johnny). Busy time.

I know some people were having trouble getting to the Cutting Room Floor, and I've checked and re-checked and I'm not sure why that is. I'm linking here again just to see what happens. If that doesn't work, just go to www.flickr.com/photos/cuttingroomfloor.

I'm glad y'all are looking. It makes me happy.

Breaking news from ET Online.

From this article:

Sources tell ET that last Thursday, Cloris was in the car with her son George, heading home from the 15th Annual Lint Roller Party for animals that they had attended. She turned to him and said she wasn't feeling very well. Cloris, who is 82, had recently been had a cold and had been having trouble breathing, so he took her to the hospital, and they went to the emergency room.

Okay, first, the 15th Annual Lint Roller Party? Somebody explain this to me. I know I could Google it, but this is more fun.

Second, she had recently been had a cold? Do these sites really have no copy editors, or grammar checkers, or PEOPLE WHO KNOW THE ENGLISH?

And now it's summer.

Originally uploaded by buffpuff

Some time soon I bet I'll be able to think of lots of things to write about on here that don't always involve the word "FUCK", in all caps like that, repeatedly.

Our lawyer has filed some stuff and sent a letter to Kane and Jude's mom. Of course, when she laid down this decision she immediately stopped communicating with us- won't answer the phone, won't return our calls. So we're still not hearing from her at all, still being avoided, so we have no way of knowing if she's received it yet, if she understands the severity of the situation, if she knows how bizarre it will be if she has to go sit in a court and talk in front of our families and lawyers and a judge about her life and all the things that have happened to her and all the things that she's done and still try to come out of it at the end saying "And that's why I'm a great mom."

One day soon, after all this mess has passed, I'll probably go into much more detail about their mother, if for no other reason so everyone reading will understand why we have been so panic-stricken, why we worry around the clock about what she might do next. Up until recently I have made some passing comments, but I've never felt the need to make her personal business public because I figured, hey, she deserves to have her skeletons in the closet, she deserves her privacy, I can leave well enough alone.

Now it has become clear that all those details, events, secrets, are going to be affecting me on a regular basis. I have put a lot of time and effort into trying to take good care of Kane and Jude; I don't feel obligated to a woman who will willingly jerk them around just to try and get her way. If nothing else, even if it weren't for how much I love them, even if it weren't for how much I love their father, if there were no other reasons in the world for me to worry about them they would still be Reed's brothers. He loves them and loves playing with them and looks up to them. That alone makes me wildly fierce about who's caring for them, how they're being cared for.

In other news, I started taking a different birth control pill and it immediately made my period stop. Just like that. No more. It is making me sick as a dog, but the sickness is slowly tapering off, and I AM NOT HAVING A PERIOD. After three months of it, it's a big deal.


Now if I could just stumble upon a good attitude and a million dollars, all would be right with the world.

Not even kidding.

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Originally uploaded by cuttingroomfloor

This week has been really, awfully, terribly long, filled with thinking, re-thinking, fearing, raging, planning, calculating, researching, puking, bleeding, drinking, and then fearing and thinking and planning some more.

In other words, you have not wanted to be around me this week. Someone send Jason and Kristi a medal- they spent a lot of time with me this week.

I'm looking back on pictures from our show and trying to relive the happiness, the carefreeness, the feeling that things are good and will continue to get better.

This picture has most of my most favorite girls in it. DON'T EVEN GET PISSED OF IF YOU'RE NOT IN THE PICTURE AND WANT TO BE ONE OF MY FAVORITE GIRLS. I have others. These are must most of 'em.

Now is the time for the breakdown.

There is nothing like ending a nice, long day of hard work with listening to a toddler scream.

Reed just finished a tantrum session that included some of the most gutteral, wild screaming I've ever heard him emit. He didn't want to put his shirt on, he didn't want to take it off. He didn't want a popsicle, a drink of water, milk, some french fries. He didn't want to be left in bed, he didn't want to be taken out of it. He didn't want me to leave him alone, he didn't want me near him, he didn't want me to talk to him, he didn't want any of his toys, his bah, Jude's slinky.

If ever there has been a time when I've thought "That's my boy!", this is it.

I am in day three of constant thought, worry, and rage about my step-children's mother's inability to see past the end of her own nose. It's eating me alive in a way that's both emotionally and physically painful. I allow myself to forget sometimes, when things go smoothly with her for a few months, that we're dealing with someone who is manipulative, thoughtless, and calculating.

I am in day 782 (or 60, if we're being literal) of bleeding like a stuck pig. It is wearing me out, I have to tell you. I often think of the ob/gyn, the doctor who delivered Reed, chuckling and saying, "Girl, you're headed for a hysterectomy!" as if it was funny or cute or something to be amused over. Part of me thinks, well, I guess I better call the doctor. But I have some experience with that, the seeing of doctors for this condition. I saw my pediatrician about it when I was thirteen; I've since seen general practioners and gynocologists alike. I've taken various drugs and herbs and eaten sweet potatoes and had a d and c ("dusting and cleaning") and slept with my feet on piles of pillows and drank hot tea. The only thing that's ever had any effect is taking birth control pills and that only helps somewhat, some of the time and the side effects include CRAZY and ILL and EMPTY BANK ACCOUNT.

I'm catharting all over the place and I hope you can bear with me, because I have a feeling there will be more of this over the next few days or weeks or months. For now I'm drinking beer and sleeping on a towel. Jason has never felt more lucky to be married to such a sex machine.

Screaming toddlers, leaking pipes, and a bag full o' tampons.

Tonight I'm feeling slightly melancholy, and I'm thinking that perhaps it's because of the, I don't know, MONTH-AND-A-HALF LONG Advil and Tampax binge I've been on.

I truly hope that none of the few boys who read this blog (Hey, Jason! Hey, Jason! Hey, Thom! ROBERT, are you reading this?) are horrified that I write this stuff, that I sneak it in too quickly for them to look away and think about baseball, or comic books, or girls who aren't currently menstruating. Or girls who aren't menstruating who play baseball and read comic books- THAT WOULD BE SO HOT.

Today I worked eight hours with an ace bandage strapped tightly around my ribs and, I have to tell you, it helped. Then Jason told me that the plumbing is not fixed, and I had to grip down onto the steering wheel tightly, tightly enough to stop my body from spontaneously throwing itself out of the window of my car whilst in motion.

I must say I feel like what I'm doing isn't so much circling the drain as persevering. There is a difference- that moment where I manage not to throw myself out the window of a moving car that I am driving? That's the difference.

P.S. I talked to someone tonight who I haven't talked to in quite a while, who I love very much. At one point, I had to tell him to hang on, and he got the immense pleasure of listening to me fighting a bag of peanuts out of Reed's hands. He said, "Dude, is he talking now?" I was like, "Yuh-huh!" He then said his significant other has baby fever, and I was like, "Well, just let me lock her in a room with Reed for about 48 hours. And I'll go drink."

Single-handedly keeping Stayfree in business.

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Originally uploaded by buffpuff

I haven't been writing enough lately. It has something to do with my INTENSE EXHAUSTION- it causes me to pay less attention to the things that aren't absolutely necessary to make it from getting out of the bed in the morning to getting into the bed at night.

I am now the proud owner of one less baby and one more little boy. It is truly bizarre how much he understands and can communicate on a daily basis. He tells me what makes him sad, what makes him happy, when he's hungry and thirsty, when he's tired. He listens when I'm talking to other people and asks me questions about the stories I tell.

Living with Kane, Jude, and Reed is unlike anything I could have possibly predicted for myself. They are loud, rough, funny, irreverent. Some days it's like living with every male friend and boyfriend I've ever had, except at the end of the day I still want to be around them.

I mean, you know, most of the time.

Anyways, most days I lean heavily on patience, perseverance, Jesus, instinct, and the telephone to make it through.

Last night I actually found myself in bed, reading, and thinking that I couldn't wait until bedtime tonight. I was in my bed, and longing for being in my bed, just 24 hours later. Wrap your head around that one. I just knew that today would be a test, a wonderful day that would start with a lot of candy, so much sugar that Reed would vibrate, and that Jason would be at work all day, that there would be laughter and wonder but many, many fits and tantrums and misunderstandings and impatience. And today was beautiful and affirming and lovely, and long and exhausting.

The first period I had since November is still here, still happening, one month long so far. This is a condition I've been dealing with since I was thirteen years old, and I've been to numerous doctors countless times to try and deal with it. When it flares up like this it is so consuming that it becomes difficult to see past it, to remember that there MIGHT be a time again when I won't have to carry 17 pounds of lady supplies, along with iron pills and ibuprofen, everywhere I go, that the intense and lasting rushing hormones won't control my emotions forever, that one day I will be normal again.

That last one is a real stretch; I think I won't hold my breath.

Love, Buffy.

Coming home from a trip is always depressing for me; I'm not really sure, maybe it's the end of something I've looked forward to, or having to leave the people I've been dying to see, or going back to work, or going back to a stinky catbox and moldy leftovers in the fridge. Whatever it is, it's the way it's always been.

Today I'm particularly overwhelmed; I'm not afraid to reveal that I am having the first period I've had since the beginning of November. It has been a while, and the intense rush of hormones is really hitting me hard tonight. The melancholy and fear and loneliness and just the absolute ache, it's like a large blunt object hitting me in the back of my head from inside my stomach.

It's a bad night for the Oscars, and YES, the Oscars should always be planned around my menstrual cycles, because every speech and every look and all the subject matter is just keeping me in tears and I'm running out of tissues.

I've always been a movie-watcher, a person who enjoys films- comedies, tragedies, documentaries, musicals, cartoons, whatever there is. There was a time when I knew a lot about film, the making of, the content of, the best actors and best performances. I am no longer so much in the know. Since I had Reed I have been, shall we say, emotional, and it makes me avoid things that bring too much to the surface. Really, the sadness or fear or regret that a good movie brings out in me will last days, sometimes weeks, and I've found myself in a place where I just don't even pay attention to what's coming out and what's on dvd and what's nominated and who's a hopeful, if only as a defense mechanism. I'm too afraid, really, of what I might feel and how long it might take to go away to get involved. It's sad, because when I was invited to join an Oscar pool I realized that I hadn't seen a single film that had been nominated in any category this year. While it's true that the pool was about guesses, whether educated or not, and I was welcome to join in and give my best guess regardless, it's still sad to think how much good shit I'm missing. I mean, I'm thoroughly aware that I chose not to see the movies, that this isn't something that is being done to me or something that is just happening to me, but it's still all sad.

In other words, I'd be sad if I was watching them, and now I'm sad that I'm not watching them.

Right now someone needs to be handing Jason a medal for staying married to me.

Anyway, I decided that I would write the Oscar speech that I will give if ever I win one. I mean, with all those speeches about not giving up and never recognizing the impossible, I am realizing that I could one day win an Oscar in any one of the many categories. So I decided to think about what I'd like to say.

Thank you to the Academy for recognizing my intense dedication to my craft. This Oscar for Best Jokes Ever/Most Stylish, Affordable, and Unique Jewelry Ever/Best Most Serious Actress/Best Friend/Most Attention to the Picking Up of Socks/Best On-Set Cheerleader/Best Keep-Your-Drinks-Full Lady really means so much, because it reinforces my deep love of actors, movies, entertainment, and the art of getting away from it all (thank you, Jack Nicholson).

Thank you to my husband for being able to deal with it all, for taking care of my children when I can't, and for being so supportive, attentive, unwavering, trustworthy, and so different from every other man I've ever spent any time with.

Thank you to all the other people in the film- Johnny Depp, Leonardo DiCaprio, Brad Pitt, George Clooney, Çasey Affleck, I love you all. I'm sorry that I can't say yes to all of your lovely, heartfelt marriage proposals, but Jason Agan is a sexy motherfucker, too hot for words really, but just in case he ever wises up and leaves me I'll keep your numbers so I can call you and cry and read you haikus that I wrote for Jason that he won't respond to when I send them to him on Myspace.

Thank you to Russell Means, Sherman Alexie, John Kennedy Toole, and Kurt Vonnegut for writing that makes me at once so sorrowful and joyous that it has inspired me to keep living, if only to see if maybe life is as interesting, as heart-breaking, as unforgiving and callous, as rewarding as you all make it out to be.

Thank you, finally, to God and my mother for bringing me into this world that is so terrifying, horrifying, beautiful, and odd, but bringing me into a particular place where I am not in the middle of a war, not physically or mentally abused, not afraid for my life (in an immediate sense), not homeless, not alone, not forsaken. Thank you both for giving me this life in which I am surrounded by these crazy, ridiculous people who love me and take care of me, without whom I would be so lost, so lonely, so abjectly pointless, that I would have to just bash myself on the head with this Oscar and get it over with. Thank you for bringing me into a world where there is a Reed to talk to me about playing guitar with his pick, where there is an Aunt CJ and an Uncle Rog to laugh with me and remind me why life should be celebrated and to teach me how to make a latte, where there is a Kristi to come home to even if I have to wait a few days because she's in law school WHAT AN EXCUSE, where there are beaches and big water and sand and family and parties and dancing. AND DANCING.

Thank you, Nick Agan, for not ripping my arms out of their sockets. This has allowed me to keep writing, keep typing, and keep picking my nose at red lights.

And thank you, True Baker, for just letting me know that there exists a seven-foot-tall, John Kennedy, Jr. look-alike who is sweet and loves his mother and asks me to dance. You may not be quite as sexy as my tattooed, red-headed husband, but that's an awful lot to live up to, especially with all that equine-vetting you have to do, and I will definitely recommend you to all of my friends.